[Causes of recurrence of patients with chromaffin tumors]

From 1957 to 2001, 520 patients with pheochromocytomas were operated. Two hundred and sixty patients were followed up from 4 to 21 years (8.4 +/- 1.9 years on the average). Complaints of 83 (31.9%) patients were similar to those before removal of the primary tumor. There was no evidence of tumors in 34 patients. Chromaffin tumors were revealed in 49 (18.9%) patients with clinical symptoms of hypercatecholaminemia. In 27 (55.1%) cases contralateral tumors were detected, in 11 of 27--the disease was familial. Extraadrenal chromaffin tumors occurred in 6 (12.2%) patients. In 8 of 49 (16.3%) patients recurrent clinical symptoms resulted from metastasis, malignant tumor after the first operation was diagnosed morphologically only in 6 of them. True recurrence of tumor at the in site of primary operation was recorded in 8 (16.3%) patients, including in 2 patients with MEN-2 in multicentric but benign tumor. Thus, true recurrence was diagnosed in 6.15% of 260 patients. True recurrence is most probable in multicentric tumor, when the tumor involves adjacent organs and tissues, and in vascular emboli in great vessels.